security sector reform is a top down idea, that needs bottom up

SECURITY SECTOR REFORM IS A TOP

DOWN IDEA, THAT NEEDS BOTTOM UP

IMPLEMENTATIONENGAGING CIVIL SOCIETY AND INTEGRATING GENDER IN SSR

OPERATION 1325

www.operation1325.se

REPORT FROM THE SECURITY SECTOR REFORM AND RESOLUTION 1325 CONFERENCE, STOCKHOLM (SWEDEN), 25–27 NOVEMBER 2009

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Cultural Humanitarian Fund, Sukhumi, Georgia

European Commission

FOKUS Forum for Women and Development, Norway

Folke Bernadotteacademy, Sweden

General Secretariat of the Council of the EU

Geneva Center for Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF)

ICO EUSR Kosovo (International Civilian Offi ce EU Special Representative)

Kosovar Gender Studies, Kosovo

Kvinna till Kvinna foundation, Sweden

Netherlands Institute of International Relations Clingendael, Netherlands

Operation 1325

Swedish National Criminal Police

Swedish National Defence College

Swedish Section of Women’s International Leauge for Peace and Freedom

Union of Wives of Invalids and Lost Warriors in Georgia, Georgia

United Nations International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (UNIN-

STRAW)

University of Dayton, USA

Women’s Political Resource Centre (WPRC), Georgia

The report was written by Ulrika LorentziEditorial advisors: Anna Sundén, Frida Oredsson & Michelle Moss Photos: Ulrika LorentziLayout and illustration: Anna ÅgrahnPrint: Lidbergs Grafi ska AB, Stockholm Printed in March 2010

The Security Sector Reform and Resolution 1325 Conference was held in Stockholm (Sweden), 25 – 27 November 2009. The aim of the conference was that participants would learn more about security sector reform (SSR), gender and the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 On Women, Peace and Security (UNSCR 1325). Another aim was to develop a common language for, and better understanding between, the different actors.

Facts about the Security Sector Reform and Resolution 1325 Conference

The Security Sector Reform and Resolution 1325 Conference was organised by Operation 1325 with fi nancial support by the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Folke Bernadotte Academy and the Swedish National Board of Youth Affairs.

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SECURITY SECTOR REFORM IS A TOP DOWN IDEA, THAT NEEDS BOTTOM UP IMPLEMENTATION

Summary ............................................................................................................................................................................................... 4

Challenges ............................................................................................................................................................................................. 4

Engage civil society ................................................................................................................................................................................ 4

Integrate gender ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 5

Advice to civil society ............................................................................................................................................................................. 5

Advice to governmental and intergovernmental organisations .............................................................................................................. 5

“Security sector reform is really democratization” .......................................................................................................................... 6

What is security? .................................................................................................................................................................................... 6

Civil society and local ownership ............................................................................................................................................................ 7

Sexual and gender based violence a security issue? ............................................................................................................................ 8

Who is on the assessment team and what questions do they pose? .................................................................................................... 8

SSR and resolution 1325 – security, human security and gender ................................................................................................... 9

Gender is not a luxury issue ................................................................................................................................................................... 9

Gender and security ............................................................................................................................................................................. 10

Gender and SSR .................................................................................................................................................................................. 10

This sounds great, but this is why it will not work ................................................................................................................................. 11

Experiences from Kosovo, Abkhazia and Georgia ......................................................................................................................... 12

Fulfi lling two tasks. EU Monitoring Mission Georgia ............................................................................................................................ 12

“The female perspective on security is much broader.” Abkhazia ........................................................................................................ 14

Ten years of international presence. Kosovo ....................................................................................................................................... 14

“We know that peace is priceless.” Georgia ......................................................................................................................................... 16

Gender and SSR in European Security and Defence Policy missions: entry point for civil society ......................................... 17

Working with civil society is messy, but that’s the point ........................................................................................................................ 17

How to engage civil society organisations and integrate gender in ESDP ........................................................................................... 18

Panel feedback on the group work ....................................................................................................................................................... 19

The way forward ................................................................................................................................................................................. 20

What will be your next contribution to gender mainstreaming and SSR? ............................................................................................ 21

Last words .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 22

Public Seminar: Securitizing Women and Gender Equality: Who and What Is It Good For? ..................................................... 24

Contents

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The Security Sector Reform and Resolution 1325 Conference was unique in that it brought together groups that rarely meet, but could benefi t from get-ting together more often: local and international civil society and governmental and intergovernmental organisations. All these groups have to be included to make a security sector reform (SSR) successful.

The objective of SSR is: “reforming security institu-tions to be effective, accountable and affordable”. The SSR agenda is to widen the security concept from a narrow focus on military security to include political and economic security, and to deepen the concept of national security to include security for the individual, i.e. human security.

The United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 On Women, Peace and Security, (resolution 1325), is the fi rst resolution ever passed by the Se-curity Council that specifi cally addresses the impact of war on women, and women’s contributions to confl ict resolution and sustainable peace. It recog-nises the centrality of gender in establishing lasting peace and security.

Local ownership is crucial for SSR, but diffi cult to achieve with a top down approach. Civil society plays an important role in creating local ownership and making the reform sustainable when the inter-national SSR team leaves a specifi c region. Civil society organisations (CSOs) offer a different per-spective to governmental organisations and tend to be the experts on what is happening on the ground. They have networks for spreading information both to the local population and back to the SSR team.

Furthermore, to be effective the SSR process needs a gender perspective to take into account the se-curity threats on men and women as well as boys and girls. A gender sensitive, and gender transfor-mative, SSR process will contribute to establishing lasting peace, security and a gender equal society. Challenges The role of civil society in SSR, and the ways in which gender can be included in these reforms,

were two major issues discussed at the conference and it became clear that these two issues are in-terlinked. Conference participants identifi ed the following challenges that need to be overcome to enable the inclusion of civil society and gender into the SSR process.

• Lack of cooperation between the different actors. • Lack of political will. • Lack of knowledge about gender issues and their relevance to working in the fi eld. • Lack of gender training for those who plan, and for those who are employed in, SSR. • Peacekeeping operations are designed to achieve swift results. It is therefore diffi cult to incorporate is-sues of gender equality in the process of change. • It is diffi cult for CSOs to know when and how to contact the peacekeeping mission. • CSOs have their own agendas, some of which are very narrow. In fact, some organisations are devel-oped as a means to get funding, rather than repre-senting its’ citizens.

Engage civil societyThere were several ideas on how to overcome these challenges. In regards to civil society involve-ment many of the ideas were about communication. For example:

• Invite many different CSOs. • Create a civil society focal point, e.g., one point of contact with a long term position. • Create sustainable means of communication, for example one phone number. • Recruit persons who speak the local language. It is impossible to have an interpreter every time you make a call. There is also a risk that the mission’s main contacts are international organisations in-stead of the local organisations that do not speak English.• Proposals from local organisations should be con-sidered carefully by the missions and there should

Summary

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be transparency about how information from the proposals may have been used. Feedback should also be given.

Integrate genderDiscussions concerning integration of a gender per-spective in SSR processes resulted in a range of ideas covering several different areas: • Recruit more women for peacekeeping opera-tions. • Recruit gender expertise on all levels, including the assessment team. • Include a gender advisor with appropriate infl u-ence and suffi cient funding. • Data collected and analysed need to be disaggre-gated by gender, for both the recipient communities and fi eld missions. • The mission should invite several women's or-ganisations for dialogue about gender, and what it means in the local context. • Carry out systematic and consistent gender train-ing, where gender is integrated into all training mod-ules rather than a two hour stand alone module, for those who plan missions, recruit personnel and for those who are employed in SSR.

Advice to civil societyThe different actors at the conference were given the opportunity to give advice to the other actors, i.e., governmental and intergovernmental actors to civil society actors and the other way around. Pre-sented below is some of the advice to civil society: • Be more concrete in your proposals. The EU should be transparent but you should be able to ask

the right questions. Concrete proposals have more of a chance to be taken up by the working groups in EU. • Lobby for pre-deployment training to make sure that mission staff knows how to include civil society and a gender perspective. • International women's organisations should help women's organisations in countries like France, Italy and Spain to lobby for pre-deployment train-ing and that more women are sent to missions from these countries, which are large contributors to Eu-ropean Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) mis-sions and which tend to lack gender awareness. Show the documents that these countries have al-ready signed!

Advice to governmental and intergovern-mental organisationsIn the same manner as above, governmental and intergovernmental organisations were given advice from civil society organisations:

• Encourage donors to fund lobbying. Donors prefer concrete projects and don’t tend to appreciate the need to strengthen civil society and their advocacy capabilities. • Study the power structures, e.g., law enforcement, police, defence and political powers, and defi ne their level of gender sensitivity. Civil society can help by providing information. • The gender equality council should do research on security needs for women, produce a high qual-ity report and get support from the EU commission to distribute the information.

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– How many of you work with security sector reform? Helena Vazquez asked participants at the fi rst day of the conference. This day was dedicated to representatives from civil society working with women’s rights.

A few raised their hands, not very confi dently. Hel-ena Vazquez herself raised her hand without hesi-tation. She is an independent consultant as SSR advisor and has worked with the EU, the Swed-ish government, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and the UN.

Her point was that many of the participants proba-bly do work with SSR. All the people that participate in the process of change in a post-confl ict society are, in a sense, SSR actors.

– SSR is really democratization, Helena Vazquez argued.

The objective of SSR is: “reforming security institu-tions to be effective, accountable and affordable”. This is not as straight forward as it sounds, Helena Vazquez explained. To obtain accountability, you need transparency to let other people know what you are doing. This is diffi cult, especially for the military. It’s also diffi cult to determine what it means to have affordable security. There is tendency to believe that “hard security”, for instance an army, is better the more it costs. However, a more expen-sive army does not necessarily respond to all the risks. Kosovo, for example, has been told that they don’t need an army. Having an army is old fash-ioned. In fact, it would be better to spend the mon-ey on high trained gender mainstream experts and experts on human rights. But, because the leaders in Kosovo feel their boarders are threatened, they want an army.

It is important to remember that in a process of change there are winners and losers. Some people with power will lose control.

– SSR is about trust, says Helena Vazquez. The timing is critical. You have to get it right from the beginning, otherwise it’s very diffi cult to go back and restart.

What is security?What are the three most important things you think of when you hear the word security? Helena Vazquez asked everybody to write their answers down and discuss them. Some points in the discus-sion were:

• Peace – without peace there is no security. • Having no war does not necessarily equal secu-rity. It's more a social and political question. • “A police force that I can trust and not be afraid of and that would understand my story”. • A legal system with gender sensitive laws. • Individual security to preserve your identity and express oneself. • Freedom of movement.• Physical security – freedom from violence.

• Well-being, not being afraid, living without fear.

“Security sector reform is really democratization” Helena Vazquez

“SSR is a top down idea, that needs bottom up imple-mentation.”

Helena Vazquez, Security Sector Reform Advisor

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• Good governance, both military and other issues. • Food security. • Health and education. • Environmental security, for example protection of the Black Sea.

Helena Vazquez has done this exercise with many different groups. Mostly, the answers focus on se-curity for yourself as an individual: the laws to pro-tect you, having food on the table, the right for your children to go to school. Only one group, a military group from the Middle East, could not see beyond state security at all.

Human security is a relatively new concept that in-corporates all these different aspects of security for individuals, i.e., economic, food, health, environ-mental, and political security. This does not mean that protection of boundaries is not important any-more but human security is a different starting point. The reason to protect the boundaries is to serve the citizens.

SSR is a fairly recent concept and a hot topic in in-ternational politics. It has been discussed on policy level for some time and is now starting to be imple-mented. Donor governments and policy makers in the West see SSR as a tool to create a new world order after the end of the cold war. It has become more obvious how interlinked we all are. For ex-ample a war in Iraq has consequences on munici-palities in Sweden, with a dramatic increase of refu-gees. SSR has been proclaimed as THE solution.

Helena Vazquez does not think it is as simple as that. But it is a step forward in regards to under-standing that security and development go hand in hand. There is no point in building a school if the security situation is so bad that the children cannot go to school anyway. Differences between traditional security agenda and security sector reform agenda (slide).

Civil society and local ownershipTo be effective, security sector reforms need to in-volve the whole society. Local ownership of the pro-cess is essential.

– It’s an interesting contradiction, said Helena Vazquez. SSR is a top down idea, that need bot-tom up implementation.

It is very diffi cult to create local ownership from above, almost impossible. Ownership needs to spark off from society. Donors have to fi nd ways to support those who want to achieve change. To ac-complish that,donors have to overcome two chal-lenges. Traditional security actors have to under-stand the advantages with including civil society and civil society needs to see the building of secu-rity sector reform as an opportunity. Petra Tötterman Andorff, from the Swedish section of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, pointed out that the Swedish SSR policy does not pay enough attention to the important role that civil society must play in SSR. The absence of civil society in policy making results in diffi culties to obtain funding to build civil society in post-con-

Traditional security agenda during the seminar were

Focus on military security

Security of the state –

national security

Widening of the security concept

Deepening of the security concept

AND non-military security –

political, economic

AND security of the individual –

human security

Security sector reform agenda

Security of the state –

national security

AND non-military security –

political, economic

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fl ict areas. In the Democratic Republic of Congo the policy makers didn’t fi nd civil society important, ac-cording to Rosan Smits, from the Netherlands Insti-tute of International Relations Clingendael.

– The international community did not label civil society groups as security actors and for that reason, they were not involved in the SSR de-sign and implementation, she explained. How-ever, by not involving them you risk that they will act in a counterproductive manner.

So, what actors should be considered in SSR? A group discussion made it clear that there is no blue-print, not one model that would fi t every situation. However, as with any development work it’s crucial to look at the context. Do NGOs really represent the citizens or are they just groups trying to get fund-ing? How should we deal with illegal groups that have mandated security to society?

One lesson Helena Vazquez learnt from working with both governments and NGOs is that it is impor-tant to include many different NGOs. Civil society is not always as present as the donors may wish, and not in the traditional way. Sometimes SSR teams have to identify other kinds of groups to work with.

On the other hand, it is often diffi cult for NGOs to know who they should talk to and when. Many of the women from post-confl ict countries saw dif-fi culties in identifying the actors who plan security measures in their countries. It is not only the gov-ernment or the military, the “geopolitical giants” are involved too.

Sexual and gender based violence a secu-rity issue?Do SSR projects incorporate women’s security risks? Several participants were sceptical. Re-search done by women’s groups in the Republic of Congo (DRC) showed that women did not regard the police as an institution that could take care of women’s security, said Rosan Smits, from the Neth-erlands Institute of International Relations Clingen-dael. Their report had some effect, but not enough. Only in March 2009 efforts were made to link SSR to combating sexual violence in DRC. However, sex-ual violence is still by no means a priority within the

SSR program, because it is dealt with as a human rights issue (as opposed to a security issue). Hel-ena Vazquez claimed that violence against women must be a security issue. It is a question of more than half of the population at risk. Still it is not cap-tured in SSR policy. Several participants stressed that more work has to be done, for example there is an urgent need for a global database on sexual and gender based violence.

Who is on the assessment team and what questions do they pose?Because timing is critical for SSR, the planning stage of the process is very important. Who is on the assessment team? Who will they contact and what questions will they pose? Josefi ne Karlsson, from Swedish section of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, pointed out that Swedish assessment teams never have represen-tatives from civil society. Helena Vazquez verifi ed that picture. In the EU the assessment teams are ad hoc. They lack systematic processes for gather-ing information.

If you send a policeman, a military person and a lawyer you will get their perspective. EU has real-ized that this is a problem and has developed a SSR assessment framework. According to Helena Vazquez this is a step in the right direction.

Conference participants discussed the proposal for an EU assessment framework in groups. It is an ex-tensive document and there was not enough time to go through it all. Some groups chose to focus on a checklist for the role of women. They found it hope-ful that this checklist was in the document, but one group found it problematic that it was a checklist on its own, not integrated into the other issues. Anoth-er point was that if EU assessment teams were to be able to use this checklist, they would need other capacities in the team than they have today. For in-stance, gender sensitive skills and more knowledge of the civil society.

– It is all about people, at the end of the day, Hel-ena Vazquez concluded. Policy makers some-times put high hopes into tools but we have to remember that SSR is just an instrument. It will not solve all our problems.

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Gender is not a luxury issue On the second day of the conference participants from governmental and intergovernmental organi-sations were welcomed. Natalie Hudson, profes-sor at the University of Dayton, USA, talked about gender and started her presentation by saying what gender mainstreaming is not:

1. Not simply about women’s rights.2. Not simply protection of women.3. Not just gender balance.4. Not a luxury issue.

Gender mainstreaming is about men and women and how their socially constructed roles in a given

SSR and resolution 1325 – security, human security and gender. Natalie Hudson

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society are critical to the work we do. The European commission has the following defi nition of gender mainstreaming:

Gender mainstreaming is the integration of the gen-der perspective into every stage of policy process-es – design, implementation, monitoring and evalu-ation – with a view to promoting equality between women and men. It means assessing how policies impact on the life and position of both women and men – and taking responsibility to re-address them if necessary. This is the way to make gender equal-ity a concrete reality in the lives of women and men creating space for everyone within the organisa-tions as well as in communities - to contribute to the process of articulating a shared vision of sus-tainable human development and translating it into reality.

– In other words, taking the lives of women and men seriously, Natalie Hudson summoned.

Gender mainstreaming concerns all kinds of activi-ties, for example in building a bridge there are gen-der questions. If you build a bridge only for cars, women may not be able to use it because in many countries, they don’t have cars. A gender perspec-tive shows the need to build a foot path.

Natalie Hudson explained that a gender perspective can be gender sensitive, positive or transformative. A gender sensitive approach is aware of gender dif-ferences and raises awareness. A gender positive approach goes beyond that and addresses gender relations. A gender transformative approach also recognises the long term implications of different actions, for instance a gender based violence cen-tre may have long term implications for women’s empowerment. Ideally the questions on gender, how women interact with men or other women and men with men, are internalised at all levels.

Gender and securityResolution 1325 is the fi rst resolution ever passed by the Security Council that specifi cally addresses the impact of war on women, and women’s contri-butions to confl ict resolution and sustainable peace. It recognises the centrality of gender in establishing lasting peace and security.

A common gender mainstreaming tool in United Nations documents is the tool “3 P”. The 3 P’s are participation, prevention and protection. Natalie Hudson wants to add a fourth P, prosecution, the rule of law. She thinks that resolution 1325 sums up the 4 P’s. It is a resolution on women, peace and security but the questions raised concern both men and women. When you look at participation it is im-portant that there are women at the decision mak-ing tables, but also that the men and women are from both rural and urban places etc. Or when you look at the unique protection needed for women it will also raise questions on what unique vulnerabili-ties men meet.

Gender and SSRThe big challenge today is to integrate a gender pos-itive and transformative perspective in the security sector reform processes. Natalie Hudson identifi ed the following points to overcome that challenge:

• Gender experts have to be on the assessment team. • The collection and analysis of data need to be dis-aggregated by gender, both for the recipient com-munities and ESDP fi eld missions. • EU offi cials should collaborate with local women's

“EU offi cials should collaborate with local women’s organisations, not just one or two but several organisations.”

Professor Natalie Hudson, University of Dayton, USA

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organisations, not just one or two, but several or-ganisations. • Systematic and consistent gender training, where gender is integrated into all training modules rather than a two hour stand alone module, for all security sector personnel. • Increased recruitment of women.

Some missions have gender advisors. Natalie Hud-son argued that gender advisors are useful but only if they are taken seriously. The mission should require a set of skills (just being a woman doesn't make you a gender advisor). The gender advisor needs to have access to every level in the chain of command (and not just be someone down the hall where you send all the women). The position also needs funding.

The representatives from the women's organisa-tions in Georgia recognised the problem with lack of funding for gender advisors. They have been work-ing with the gender advisor in the ESDP mission in Georgia and invited her to seminars. But they have realised that she cannot do anything because she doesn't have suffi cient funding. Pia Sellerup, from the General Secretariat of the Council of the EU, argued that to take the work of gender advisor for-ward it cannot be just one person, separated from the rest of the mission. The success of the gender advisor depends on the mandate of the mission. This scenario was confi rmed by Luljeta Demolo, from the Kosovar Gender Studies, who said that gender staff in the mission in Kosovo was marginal-ized because they did not have a high position. In such a large mission, an appropriate level of senior-ity or infl uence is needed to have an impact on the mission and on the ground.

It is important to embed issues of sexual and gen-der based violence in the SSR process. If taken seriously this could change how societies legally defi ne and deliver security. Natalie Hudson argued that this happened when a gender-based violence desk offi ce was established in the Rwandan Nation-al Police Headquarters. There are also new entry points from UNIFEM in the Wilton Park Conference Women Targeted or Affected by Armed Confl ict: What Role for the Military Peacekeeper, 2008.

This sounds great, but this is why it will not work What is the biggest challenge where you are? After discussion in small groups conference participants came up with the following suggestions.

• Lack of knowledge about gender issues and their relevance to working in the fi eld. • Lack of political will. • Lack of cooperation between the actors. • Peacekeeping operations are designed to achieve swift results. It is therefore diffi cult to incorporate is-sues of gender equality in the process of change. • Lack of gender training for those who plan, and those who are employed in, peace keeping opera-tions. • Lack of communication with local country repre-sentatives about what is needed there from a gen-der perspective.

Some comments came up on what is needed to overcome these challenges. Alla Gamakharia, from the Cultural Humanitarian Fund, Sukhumi in Geor-gia, said that women in Georgia wish to have EU missions that are able to confront the male leaders of Georgia on gender issues.

– We on the ground are ready but we need ad-ditional help from the top, Alla Gamakharia con-cluded.

Mika-Markus Leinonen, from the General Secre-tariat of the Council of the EU, Civilian Crisis Man-agement Directorate, in Brussels, emphasized the importance of gender training both for those who are planning and those who are deployed in ESDP missions.

– ESDP is one tool in the EU’s tool-box, said Mika-Markus Leinonen. We have to get our tools and acts together.

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Fulfi lling two tasks. EU Monitoring Mission Georgia– It was hard for me as a reporting offi cer to write about women’s specifi c needs and expe-riences because I did not receive information on this from the ground, said Cecilia Rosing, who has worked as a reporting offi cer in the EU Monitoring Mission (EUMM) in Georgia. She is now working at the Kvinna till Kvinna foun-dation in Sweden.

– One problem was that the observers on the ground were not gender sensitive when asking questions to the civilians about their situation.

Cecilia Rosing had no formal position as a gender advisor but she realized that the mission did not re-port on women’s security threats, for example rape, traffi cking and the specifi c situation for women in settlements for internally displaced persons or at the check points. She ended up fulfi lling two tasks, both the one as a reporting offi cer and the task to improve the work on gender issues in the mission. One of the guiding documents stressed that EUMM should promote human rights and a gender per-spective in its monitoring, data collection, reporting and staffi ng as well as take into account resolution 1325, but without a systematic approach the im-pacts were very small.

Experiences from Kosovo, Abkhazia and Georgia

13


– It was not clear to everybody in the EUMM that we could and should work with gender issues, Cecilia Rosing continued. But when we did an in-mission-training on gender and resolution 1325 there was greater interest than I expected. Especially the practical tools were appreciated.

The operational phase of the EUMM started on 1 October 2008, after the confl ict in August 2008. The Council took the decision on the 15 September. In two weeks 200 monitors were recruited. It was the fastest deployment of a mission, the EU has ever done. The mandate was monitoring and reporting. The mission had no executive power.

– One task was to create stability and promote normalisation of the situation on the ground, for example we followed up different cases such as kidnapping, said Cecilia Rosing. Since we did not have any executive power we could function as a referral mechanism, for instance to NGOs.

There were some good examples where this refer-ral mechanism worked when it came to women’s security threats. One woman was exposed to gen-der based violence and turned to the police. How-ever, when the police didn’t take the case (which is against the law) she turned to the EUMM that re-ferred the case to a local NGO that gave assistance to women exposed to gender based violence and ran a shelter, and they in turn went with her to the police. This time her case was taken.

One problem with the EUMM was the unequal gen-der balance in the mission, with a great majority be-ing male. In many cases it was necessary to have female observers and female interpreters to receive information from women on sensitive issues that concerned their security and situation.

After the in-mission gender training Gender Focal Points were established at each fi eld offi ce. In con-cert with these Gender Focal Points, Cecilia Rosing wrote a report taking into account women’s specifi c needs and experiences in the August confl ict. This report was a starting point in order to improve re-porting on these issues. Women’s Rights organi-sations got the opportunity to give their view and proposals. She stressed that gender issues should

be a part of all reporting and not a specifi c report on women, but it has to start somewhere.

This report was, as all the reports from the mis-sion, a closed report to Brussels and served as a base for further decisions on the mission’s priori-ties. Unfortunately the report was not made public and some of the women’s organisations never got to know what happened with the information they shared.

– I think some of the reports, or at least some parts of the reports, should be made public even if I understand the reason for keeping them closed, said Cecilia Rosing. It is important to make sure that the women’s organisations feel that it is not a waste of time talking to the mission.

Recommendations for improving the work with gender and security in ESDP missions:

• Be serious in recruiting women. It is not happen-ing. • Recruit gender expertise on all levels in a mis-sion. • Recruit persons who speak the language. It is im-possible to have an interpreter every time you make a call. There is also a risk that the mission’s main

““In Abkhazia women are not second to men regarding education and business, but today women are placed in a secondary place”

Irina Adleyba, Association of Women of Abkhazia.

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OPERATION 1325

contacts are with UNIFEM or other international or-ganisations instead of the local organisations that do not speak English.

• Proposals from local organisations should be con-sidered carefully by the missions and there should be transparency about how information from the proposals may have been used. Feedback should also be given.

Make sure that staff receive training on gender and resolution 1325 prior to, upon arrival of, and during a mission. There were some comments on the rec-ommendations. Mika-Markus Leinonen, from the General Secretariat of the Council of the EU Coun-cil in Brussels, said that he had been involved in the planning of the EUMM Georgia and he realizes some things could have been done better, but that the circumstances for this particular mission were special.

– It was a political act to establish a mission at such short notice, said Mika-Markus Leinonen. In regards to the composition of the mission’s staff, gender was considered in the planning but it was imperative to fi nd 200 persons in the Member States to be deployed immediately.

In reference to the reporting from missions to Brussel’s headquarters Mika-Markus Leinonen ex-plained that the reports are used by the 27 Member States to give the Head of Mission strategic guid-ance on how to implement the mandate of the mis-sion. This is a very delicate process and for this par-ticular reason, he concluded, the reports cannot be publicised. One suggestion from other participants was to publish information in the reports in a differ-ent way.

“The female perspective on security is much broader.” Abkhazia – In Abkhazia, women are not second to men regarding education and business, but today women are placed in a secondary place, said Irina Adleyba from the Association of Women of Abkhazia.

Women in Abkhazia are well educated and well represented in middle management, but in poli-

tics, there are few women. One achievement for the women’s movement was an act for provision of equal rights adopted in February 2009.

– We are aware that the act is not implemented today but we hope for changes, Irina Ableyba continued. Today women have to choose be-tween family and career. We believe that society should free women from the burden of home-making.

For men in Abkhazia, security equals a good de-fence whereas the female perspective on security is much broader, according to Irina Ableyba. Wom-en are more concerned with what kind of society is built, for example if there will be physical security and health care.

The Association of Women in Abkhazia participate in negotiations with NGOs from Georgia to gener-ate security and peace in the region. It is a very sensitive dialogue with several complicated issues, such as the question of refugees.

Ten years of international presence. KosovoLuljeta Vuniqi, from Kosovar Gender Studies in Kosovo, started her presentation by showing a slide of the key international security actors in Kosovo.

“If women would have been involved, would the picture be different? Yes, I think so. Many issues that are important for women were not discussed, for example missing people.”

Luljeta Vuniqi, Kosovar Gender Studies, Kosovo

15


• NATO Kosovo Force (KFOR) entered in 1999 and is still the most important actor. From June 12th 2008, NATO has new tasks in Kosovo which is standing down Kosovo Protection Force and estab-lish Kosovo Security Force, with only light arms.

• European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX Kosovo) is the largest civilian mission ever launched under the European Security and Defence Policy(ESDP), with a staff of 3 000. It is a monitor-ing mission, retaining a number of limited executive powers in the rule of law area, specifi cally in the police, judiciary and customs areas.

• The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). The OSCE Mission in Kosovo is the largest OSCE fi eld operation. It is mandat-ed with democracy building and promoting human rights as well as the rule of law.

• International Civilian Offi ce - European Union Spe-cial Representative (ICO/EUSR) supports Kosovo's European integration by advising the Government and community leaders in Kosovo.

– Kosovo is full of international presence, with big very ambitious missions, Luljeta Vuniqi resumed. It has been a huge experiment for ten years.

16

OPERATION 1325

There are very few women in decision making po-sitions in security institutions, peace building and peace keeping processes. The studies from the Kosovar Gender Studies in Kosovo show that the international actors lack a gender perspective and a human security perspective. For them, security in Kosovo is the army and the police.

– It is only the local women's groups that use resolution 1325 in Kosovo, said Luljeta Vuniqi.

Kosovar Gender Studies have asked women and men in Kosovo about security. The women are con-vinced that they have security problems in every sphere of their life. Men think that women are only endangered by traffi cking. For more information see Kosovar Gender Studies in Kosovo website: www.kgscenter.org

– If women would have been involved, would the picture be different? Luljeta Vuniqi asked and answered: Yes, I think so. Many issues that are important for women were not discussed, for example missing people.

“We know that peace is priceless”. Georgia– Because of what we have witnessed in the

1990’s and 2008 we know that peace is price-less, said Manana Mubeke, Union of Invalids and Lost Warriors of Georgia. The most impor-tant security issue is peace.

Women have a diffi cult situation in Georgia. There is a lack of political will to reach gender equality. Gender stereotypes are still strong and have nega-tive impacts, especially in rural areas. Women are extremely underrepresented in many areas, for example there is only one woman represented in government. There are several women active in the political parties but on election day the fi rst place on the list is always given to a man.

– Resolution 1325 made the world aware that women are crucial in the peace process, Ma-nana Mubeke continued. You cannot achieve peace without gender equality.

The Georgian experience shows that armed con-fl icts have extremely bad consequences for women and children. In Georgia women are not involved in the peace negotiations. However, there are NGOs trying to promote women, and women’s organisa-tions, to be active in peace building and confi dence building.

17


Kathrin Quesada held a workshop focusing on why European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) mis-sions should involve civil society and have a gender perspective. She works for the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF), which is one of the world’s leading institutions in the areas of SSR and security sector governance (SSG).

Security without a gender perspective will miss important parts, Kathrin Quesada explained. Men, women and children have partly different security problems. Men are exposed to security threats as robbery, assault or being forced to rape. Women are exposed to for example domestic violence, rape and sexual harassment. Children face infanticide and child marriage.

To actualise the role of civil society, Kathrin Que-sada told an anecdote from the Cité Soleil. The city needed an assessment of its security problems. The assessment team fi rst met the local police of-fi cers. They said that the city had problems with street violence and young people dealing drugs. Their conclusion was: “We need more police.” The team then met the local civil society and asked what the most urgent issues were. According to the civil society, the problem was that their children had no schools and no jobs afterwards, so they hung out in the streets. Their conclusion was: “We need more schools, jobs and community centres.”

– They are probably both right and wrong, Kath-rin Quesada said. This shows the importance of involving civil society to get a broader picture.

Working with civil society is messy, but that’s the point.What concrete arguments could be used to argue

for civil society involvement? A discussion resulted in this list: • Sustainability. Missions are only temporary. If there is no investment in civil society there is a risk that the situation goes back to confl ict.

• Different perspective.

• Cheaper, faster, more reliable.

• Civil society representatives are the experts on what the society needs and have a better under-standing of what is happening on the ground.

• With input from civil society the process is likely to achieve more support from the population.

• Opportunity to give voice to minorities. Internation-al organisations can support minority organisations and listen to their perspectives that probably would not have been heard by local authorities.

• Accountability. Civil society can make sure that security personnel do a good job, the job they have the mandate to do. They can name and shame ac-tors.

• Civil societies have networks for spreading infor-mation in a culturally relevant way. Use civil society to get information out to the people and demystify the security reform.

Reversely, several participants pointed out the need to remember that civil society is also political with sometimes very narrow agendas.

– In Georgia there are organisations we call “gongos”, said Lika Nadaraia from Women’s Political Resource Centre, Georgia. They are part of the Government but organised as NGOs and they give voice to the Government’s views.

Gender and SSR in European Security and Defense Policy missions: entry point for civil society

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OPERATION 1325

A conclusion was that working with civil society is messy, but that’s the point. CSOs can have totally different views. To get the whole picture it is neces-sary to contact several CSOs.

How to engage civil society organisations and integrate gender in ESDP. The participants were divided into groups to identify three entry points for how to increasing participation of CSOs and three entry points on how to integrate gender, in ESDP missions.. The groups were also told to identify one obstacle for doing this.

One group, that got the task of being an ESDP mis-sion, came up with the following points to increase the participation of CSOs:

1. Civil society organization focal point, e.g., point of contact with a long term position.

2. Invite many different CSOs to consultations.

3. Create sustainable means of communication, for example one phone number. Give feedback so that organisations can see if the mission used the infor-mation or not and why.

To integrate gender: 1. Gender advisor with seniority and infl uence as well as appropriate funding.

2. Gender training of staff.

3. The mission should invite several women’s or-ganisations for dialogue about gender, and what it means in the local context.

The group identifi ed the obstacle that gender is not a priority because there is a lack of political will and courage. Their strategy was to make it a priority by including gender on the political agenda and the mission mandate. Another obstacle, that was point-ed out during the presentation, is the lack of infra-structure. Some civil organisation groups may not have the possibility to contact the mission because they have no roads or no phone. The group, which was very much into character, replied:

– We are the EU and we have lots of money. We will provide transportation.

Another group got the task of being an international NGO based in Brussels and already engaged in the country where the mission would take place. Their points to increase the participation of CSOs: 1. Organise our work at fi eld level.

2. Advocacy with member states at all levels.

3. Raise awareness in the fi eld.

As means to integrate gender, they suggested: 1. Lobby for recruitment of more women in the mis-sion.

2. Empower local NGOs to interact with the mission on gender awareness, for example by facilitating round table meeting. Funding, or in other ways sup-porting the local NGOs, to do work with the mission was also suggested.

3. As an NGO, offer to do gender training with the mission.

The group identifi ed competition from other NGOs as an obstacle. Their strategy to tackle that was to form alliances or collaborate with other organisa-tions.

Two groups got the task of being a local women’s organisation. They came up with similar results. Both assumed that they were a well known NGO with funding and networks and their entry points were dependent on the mission wanting to talk to

“It has to become obvi-ous that gender is not only about the feminist move-ment”

Christian Ramet, ICO EUSR Kosovo (International Civil-

ian Offi ce EU Special Representative).

19


the organisation. Points to increase the participa-tion of CSOs from the local women’s organisations points of view were to:

1. Inform the mission that they have good data and are ready to collect more.

2. Act as a reference group, or a facilitation bridge between international mission and local communi-ty, in the area of their expertise, on cultural under-standing, how the area works etc.

3. Seek contact with the delegation prior to the mis-sion.

Entry points for integrating gender were: 1. Suggest a study on the concept of security for women and men.

2. Organise a seminar based on the result from the study.

3. Make a proposal to the parliament for national legislation.

One group identifi ed the obstacle that gender is understood as a question only about women. Their strategy to overcome that was to involve a well known man promoting gender issues, possibly an athletic type. The other group proposed the strat-egy not to mention the word gender but to present research on specifi c issues and how they infl uence men and women, boys and girls. This idea created some discussion. Lika Nadaraia, from Women’s Political Resource Centre (WPRC) in Georgia, saw a risk in trying to avoid controversial words.

– Earlier we were told to stop talking about women’s issues and refer to gender to make it more neutral, said Lika Nadaraia. Now we are told not to use the word gender either. I’m tired of running away from patriarchy.

Christian Ramet, from ICO EUSR Kosovo, argued that in his context gender and gender training doesn’t sound positive and something has to be done to change that.

– It has to become obvious that gender is not only about the feminist movement, said Chris-tian Ramet.

Panel feedback on the group workHelena Vazquez thought that the group work result-ed in many good ideas that unfortunately are dif-fi cult to fund. Advocacy and empowerment require a lot of time and resources. Donors prefer very con-crete projects.

Izabella Turtseva, from the Association of Women of Abkhazia, was surprised by the talk of resources. She thought that the missions can fund things they want to fund. This is not the case, said Pia Sellerup, from the General Secretariat of the Council of the EU. It is clearly defi ned what the funding of ESDP missions should be used for.

– The mission can host meetings with NGOs but cannot fund their activities, Pia Sellerup continued.

Izabella Turtseva liked the idea of gender training for the staff but was surprised that this hadn’t been done for years.

– We thought that in Europe you had resolved this question of gender training, said Izabella Turtseva.

Another question raised was how the missions take into account, and show respect for, local traditions. There was a discussion about how a mission can work with gender, in a country where gender issues are not considered important, without putting aside local ownership.

– How do we push gender equality when the lo-cal government and civil society does not show interest? Asked Lisa Löfquist from the Swedish National Criminal Police in Sweden.

Natalie Hudson said that missions need more sex segregated hard data to be able to show local au-thorities and civil society how gender sensitive work will improve the society for all. Another argument, Helena Vazquez continued, is that a gender per-spective is needed to understand what security is in the region. It is also a question of the donors’ priorities. If donors, like the Norwegian government, decide that women’s rights and gender equality is one of their priorities the missions cannot choose not to work with that.

20

OPERATION 1325

The last day of the conference was dedicated to ideas about how to transform the insights on gen-der, resolution 1325 and security sector reform into action. A discussion on concrete tips resulted in the following ideas:

• Gender coach. Mission staff working with gender issues often feel isolated and in need of persons with gender knowledge to discuss with.

• People in non-confl ict countries should look at their own security sector from a gender perspective. If donors want a post-confl ict country to perceive rape as a security issue, non-confl ict countries have to do that too.

• Women's organisations can look into how they can support the military in their gender education.

• Build a reserve of people who are trained and prepared to go off to any country in a post-confl ict zone. Sweden has such a reserve, built up after the experience with the fast deployment in Georgia. The EU has rosters for limited periods and is going to have a dedicated SSR roster.

• The missions should not think they are going to a ‘banana republic’. There was discussion about whether it was more important to have more women in the missions or gender sensitive men.

– Gender sensitive men are good enough, said Irina Adleyba, Association of Women of Abkha-zia.

– We have a lot of contact with the mission in Georgia, replied Alla Gamakharia, Cultural Hu-manitarian Fund, Sukhumi, Georgia. It is easier for me to collaborate with women. I believe that more women in the mission would make it eas-ier for others too.

To take the discussion on the way forward another step Toiko Kleppe, from FOKUS Forum for Women and Development Norway, and Kristen Cordell,

from the United Nations International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (UN-INSTRAW), asked everybody to imagine what the other groups could do. The task was to, identify yourself as civil society, governmental or intergov-ernmental; suggest one concrete action that you would want the “other” group to do for gender main-streaming of SSR; and how you can support them to fulfi l this concrete action.

Advice to civil society:

• Be more concrete in your proposals. The EU should be transparent but you should be able to ask the right questions. Concrete proposals have more of a chance to be taken up by the working groups in EU.

• Write a letter to the new high representative, with concrete proposals.

• Lobby for pre-deployment training to make sure that mission staff knows how to include civil society and a gender perspective.

• European Women's Lobby, and other international women's organisations, should help women's or-ganisations in countries like France, Italy and Spain to lobby for pre- deployment training and that more women are sent to missions from these countries, which are large contributors to European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) missions and which tend to lack gender awareness. Show the docu-ments that these countries have already signed!. “EU do not name and shame. It's a shame but we need someone else to do it.”Advice to governmental and intergovernmental or-ganisations

• Study the power structures, e.g., law enforcement, police, defence and political powers, and defi ne their level of gender sensitivity.

• Local government should do research on security needs for women, produce a high quality report and

The way forward

21


get support from the EU commission to distribute the information.

• Create education programs for men and women. Civil society can help by providing information.

• See to that donors fund lobbying.

What will be your next contribution to gender mainstreaming and SSR? Toiko Kleppe and Kristin Cordell asked the par-ticipants about their own commitment in regards to their contribution to gender mainstreaming and SSR. Here are some of the answers.

“We are planning meetings with the EU mis-sion. We will ask them about their gender situ-ation and what mutual questions we can solve together.” Alla Gamakharia, Cultural Humanitarian Fund, Sukhumi, Georgia.

“We will prepare 50 very well educated gender experts and train them on more concrete issues in Georgia. Their task will be to train the mis-sions in our country. This will be supported by the Georgian government. If Georgia can contrib-ute to NATO peacekeeping operation, why not contribute to gender mainstreaming and SSR?” Lika Nadaraia, Women’s Political Resource Centre (WPRC), Georgia

“I (will) report to the Civilian Planning and Con-duct Capability unit, CPCC.” Jari Varnamo, Council of the EU, CPCC, Mission Support Unit, Brussels

“I will contact the section of Women’s Interna-tional League for Peace and Freedom in France and ask how we could help them and women’s organisations in other EU countries to work with resolution 1325.” Josefi ne Karlsson, The Swedish Section of Wom-en’s International League for Peace and Freedom, WILPF

“I will continue to develop more accountability measures to ensure quality in the processes and formulate concrete proposals.” Isabelle Nilsson, the Kvinna till Kvinna Foundation, Sweden

“The only thing I will do is nagging about ac-countability.” Elka Ermenkova, The Council of EU, Civilian Plan-ning and Conduct Capability, Brussels

“I will keep on nagging about accountability as well.” Luljeta Vuniqi, Kosovar Gender Studies, Kosovo

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OPERATION 1325

The Security Sector Reform and Resolution 1325 Conference was unique in that it brought together groups that rarely meet, but could benefi t from get-ting together more often: local and international civil society and governmental and intergovernmental organisations. The evaluation at the end of the con-ference gleaned some positive feedback indicating change as we move forward. For instance Agne Glodenyte from the European commission said she would raise some of the interesting ideas from the conference with her superiors. Several participants said that they learned new things. Luljeta Vuniqi from Kosovar Gender Studies in Kosovo, said that it is more clear to her now how the EU functions and Natalie Hudson thought that the ideas from the conference will enrich her research. Christian Ramet, from ICO EUSR Kosovo, appreciated hear-ing all the different views. Elka Ermenkova from the Council of the EU said:

– Before I thought that gender was only a femi-nist thing, but now I have realized that isn’t right.

In short one could say that the conference did achieve its goals. The participants learnt more about security sector reform, resolution 1325 and gender. And the conference took some steps to develop a common language for the different actors involved in security sector reform and gender work.

One of the very last words came from Izabella Turtseva, Association of Women of Abkhazia:

– NGOs have a lot of power and potential. I ask you not to stop here. We women in Abkhazia know what security is and how important it is.

Last words

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24

OPERATION 1325

In conjunction with the conference there was a pub-lic seminar in ABF-huset, Stockholm, 27 November. This seminar focused on the question: is it a good strategy for feminist and women’s organisations to talk about women’s rights and gender equality as security issues? This question is connected to a central and ongoing discussion within the feminist movement on whether to enter the present power structures and try to change them from inside or to stay on the outside and be free to criticise.

It was in the United Nations that women activists started talking about women’s rights as a security issue, explained Natalie Hudson, professor from Dayton University. Lack of gender equality was pointed out as a security threat. They reframed their questions in a different way. The United Nations Se-curity Council Resolution 1325 On Women and Se-curity from the year 2000 is a manifestation of this. For the fi rst time the Security Council recognised women’s issues as central to what they are doing. Women activist have therefore been able to chal-lenge the traditional notions of security.

There are several examples where this strategy made it possible for women to get into security sec-tor reform discussions. Most of the participants in security sector reform do not care about women’s rights. The arguments that they are obligated to have a gender perspective, or that women’s rights is something vaguely good, don’t work. Natalie Hud-son have interviewed several activists and says; “If we can show that gender equality is good for what they are doing and will make them more effective, then they will let us in the room.”

Is this new framework good or limiting? In the short run there are many gains for the women’s move-ment. When you add “security” people tend to listen more and you will get more resources. The ques-

Public Seminar: Securitizing Women and Gender Equality: Who and What Is It Good For?

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26

OPERATION 1325

tions move up on the priority list. For women doing the work on the ground, it doesn’t matter what lan-guage will get them through the door. Some posi-tive examples are the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM)) which has found its way into discussions with the military and the se-curity sector reform in Rwanda that have included gender based violence offi ces.

In the long run there is a risk that women are in-cluded in security discussions only as nurturers, as mothers. The women activists that Natalie Hudson talked to want to work for women’s true emancipa-tion and be considered equal political counterparts. A central question is how to be taken seriously.

Lika Nadaraia, from Women’s Political Resource Centre in Georgia, has heard many times that if women are too radical they will be thrown away.

– I don’t believe in that, said Lika Nadaraia. Maybe I don’t sound diplomatic but I think we should not avoid using the words gender or women’s human rights. Instead we should scru-tinise power structures and demand our rights.

Georgia is a country in the South Caucasus. For 20 years it has been in pain of transformation and had armed confl ict with Russia, most recently in 2008. For 20 years women in Georgia have been the main breadwinners.

– We are doing everything that the state should do to keep security.

The women are organized but until now the wom-en’s movement has not had strength, Lika Nadaraia stated.

Irina Adleyba, from the Association of women from Abkhazia, talked about a similar situation in Abkha-zia during and after the armed confl ict with Geor-gia. She said that women in Abkhazia are urged to become strong and become the leaders in society and the family.

– Women are doing everything to keep their families and the country alive, but all the deci-sions are made by men, said Irina Adleyba.

Women from Abkhazia and Georgia have met in di-alogue to build trust and a sustainable peace. Irina Ableyba said that there have been men who have blocked this dialogue because they are afraid that the women will take control.

Manana Mubeke, from the Union of Invalids and Lost Warriors of Georgia, was more positive to the idea of reframing women’s rights as a security is-sue. She said that resolution 1325 is an instrument for women in Georgia to take part in high level politi-cal discussion. In Georgia, women represent only 6% of parliament, and with only one woman in gov-ernment there is no gender perspective in Georgian politics. For men in Georgia, security is a member-ship in EU and NATO.

– We want to use resolution 1325, said Manana Mubeke. Civil society is the engine for this res-olution. We hope that women will be included, not only on gender equality issues but in shap-ing the security in the country. “

“We want to use the reso-lution 1325. The civil so-ciety is the engine for this resolution. We hope that women will be included, not only on gender equality issues but in shaping the security in the country.” Manana Mubeke, Union of Invalids and Lost Warriors

of Georgia

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Operation 1325 is an umbrella organisation gathering fi ve organisations from the Swedish women’s and peace movement:

• Swedish Ecumenical Women’s Council• The Federation of International Associations for Immigrant Women• UNIFEM Sweden• Women for Peace, Swedish section• Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Swedish sectionWe also collaborate closely with the Swedish Women’s Lobby.

The overall aim of the organisation is to contribute to the implementa-tion of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (2000) by departing from its fi rst paragraph:

“Resolution 1325 […] urges Member States to ensure increased representation of women at all decision making levels in national, regional, and international institutions and mechanism for the prevention, management, and resolution of confl ict.”

Through capacity building and training, advocacy and information both in Sweden and elsewhere, Operation 1325 aims at strengthening women and women’s organizations and thereby preparing them to work at all levels and stages of confl ict prevention, management and resolu-tion. This is a report from The Security Sector Reform and Resolution 1325 Conference that was held in Stockholm (Sweden), 25 – 27 November 2009.

Operation 1325

security sector reform is a top down idea, that needs bottom up

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